Delroy Wilson and the Power of Dub

This story is about the power of dub and just a little bit about Delroy Wilson. Actually Delroy Wilson is only on the sleeves of the two records that this story is about. It was in 2003 when I was in Jamaica at the house of one of my sisters - in law. There I met Mello who used to operate a small local sound system with his brothers.

He told me it was like how a lot of Jamaicans operated their own sound. In the good old days you gained much respect from the community when you owned a sound system in Jamaica. “Im boss man! Im haffe a sound!”. And that is how Count Mello started out by the end of the sixties. He ended his sound system activities in 1990. When I told him that I was interested in reggae music, boxes and scandal bags full of 45’s and albums started to appear from under his bed and from several different closets in the house. And every time I thought I saw it all, more records appeared from somewhere.

At one point I was going through a box of albums and I found two of the same Delroy Wilson - Prophesy copies. I looked in the sleeves and I saw that both records were pressed on a Music Ism label with the title "Richie Mac - Jah is I light"? While studying these records Mello asked "You like the dubs?". I asked him what he was talking about and he told me that those were dub records I was looking at. Dub records? How do you mean?

A "small" set of speakers and the mixing desk of the sound system were still connected in the back room of the house. Now in modern style with two CD players. For the occasion a turntable appeared from under the bed and was plugged in. Mello took one of the records and put it on the turntable. He adjusted some of controls on the mixing desk and started the turntable. The first sound that came out of the speakers was a clear and nice horns line followed by a heavy and warm bassline. When the JA style speakers brought in the drums the a full horns dub filled the room. It was such a magical moment when those vibes filled the room and I was totally astonished by what I heard. I knew I encountered the power of dub in full effect on that moment.

It turned out that I found two Aquarius recorded dub albums: "LP - No.3 and 4 - Dub - Aquarius" according to the matrixes. Although the stamps on the label mention "dub lp - 1 and 2. Two solid albums full of nice and heavy dubs. I still love to play the track that was unvealed to me first. Just to revive this magical memory in dub! Mello told me they just pressed those two copies for him when he was at Dynamic Sounds one day to buy some ammunition for his Sound System. Probably they used random labels and sleeves!? Well they are specials for me!! Maybe somebody out here can fill me in about the proper labels and sleeves for these records?!